Home birth rate to expand - The Age
With a little Sunshine, home birth rate is due to expand
THE number of home births in Victoria is on the rise, with a publicly funded program using midwives from Sunshine Hospital gaining popularity.
Since the pilot scheme was launched in January, hospital midwives have overseen seven home births.
However, according to Patrice Hickey, who heads the Midwifery Group Practice for Western Health, as word has spread about the program's success, more women who meet the low-risk criteria have joined the program, electing to have home births instead of hospital and birthing centre deliveries.
Eight women are scheduled to give birth at home in December and that monthly figure is likely to accelerate through 2011, Ms Hickey said.
A pilot home birth program is also being run in Casey, with the first birth due soon. If the trials are deemed successful by the Department of Health, the program may be expanded to other Victorian hospitals.
Until recently, women who wanted to give birth at home had to pay for a private midwife to manage the pregnancy at a cost of between $1800 and $6000.
But private midwives are not insured for home births and, despite campaigning for indemnity insurance, changes to the midwifery sector will not extend coverage to private midwives attending home births. Some services provided by private midwives will, however, be covered by Medicare.
By contrast, midwives attached to public hospitals have full indemnity insurance for home births.
And, as Ms Hickey said, they also had the backing of the hospital, so she expected that increasing numbers of mothers who would have taken up the publicly funded birthing centre option will feel comfortable opting for a home birth.
''I imagine numbers will increase and the government has anticipated that,'' Ms Hickey said.
In recent years there have been about 200 home births in Victoria attended by private midwives. Conservatively, Sunshine looks set to handle about half that load.
Ms Hickey suspects that once the area's large Vietnamese community becomes aware of the program's benefits, the number will continue to climb.
Ms Hickey told The Sunday Age: ''Women from the Vietnamese community weren't keen on being cared for by midwives because [they thought it was] a second-class kind of care. Once they've understood the continuity of care they receive, they've become converts. We've just enrolled our first Vietnamese mother into the home-birth program. Once the word gets out others are certain to follow.''
Woodend resident Krista Patterson-Major had wanted to give birth at home but using a private midwife ''wasn't an option because of the cost''.
When the 30-year-old heard about the Sunshine practice on the radio, she spoke to her obstetrician about it.
Given hers was a low-risk pregnancy, she was advised to ''give them a call''.
So she did. And now, 10 days after the home birth of her son, Banjo, Ms Patterson-Major couldn't be more happy with her decision.
From about three months into her pregnancy, she was visited at home by midwife Melinda Mouat - who also made daily visits for a week after Banjo's uncomplicated, if hefty, birth. He came into the world at 4.5 kilograms.
''I built a really great relationship with Melinda,'' Ms Patterson-Major said. ''And because we had the backing of the hospital I felt completely safe.''
A transfer to Sunshine Hospital would have taken 45 minutes. But if she had decided to give birth in nearby Kyneton hospital and an emergency had occurred, she said she would have been transferred to Sunshine anyway.
After her own success, Ms Patterson-Major said she had friends who were enrolling in the program.
Ms Mouat said Woodend was the ''limit of the Western Health boundaries. We probably wouldn't go out as far as Kyneton. But the local ambulance service is aware of the home birth program and we carry all the emergency equipment as required.''
Ms Mouat said only one of the seven home births had involved a hospital transfer, and that had occurred after the baby was born. ''And everything was fine,'' she said.
Lol. So funny given the whole Herald Sun debate last week!
